BB to go for major digitization next week

Bangladesh Bank (BB) is taking a big leap forward in its process for digitizing the country`s banking sector, introducing electronic systems for offering two major banking and financial services.

Among the two systems, the central bank is set for launching tomorrow (Sunday) the Electronic Fund Transfer (EFT) software for paying back the principal amount of different saving certificates on their maturity and the monthly interests incur against the certificates.

The EFT service will be launched in the morning at the central bank headquarters, said a BB press release.

After launching the EFT software, people would no longer require to be in the banks to get the return from their investments in saving certificates as they would get paid the interest and the principal amount of saving certificates directly to the bank accounts through EFT, the release said.

The central bank last month asked all banks to make necessary arrangement to transfer interest and principal amount of saving certificates to their respective client accounts through EFT. The banks were also advised to publicise the information to make public more aware about the direct transfer facility so they could get better services.

Another major software - Real Time Gross Settlement (RTGS) system - will be introduced on October 29, said general manager of the governor secretariat AFM Asaduzzaman.

The central bank in April this year announced the implementation roadmap for RTGS system, suggesting all banks to take necessary preparations to perform live transaction over the RTGS system from October 8.

The RTGS, also known as BB-RTGS or "Go Live", is an advance technology that facilitates interbank electronic transfer of fund from one bank to another on a real time and gross basis.

The RTGS will help boost business to business (B2B) transaction along with other general transactions by enabling instant settlement of high value local currency transactions as well as government securities and foreign currency based transactions.

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has provided financial support to implement this project.